'Williams' Double Yellow' is in my mind the best hardy, blackspot resistant, double-yellow, once-blooming rose. It spreads invasively as Jack Thomas points out which is cause for concern. For me it looses the lower half of its leaves by the end of summer to a leaf spot disease (possibly alternaria leafspot) but this by no means is cause for concern as the plant is still ornamental. It produced hips for me last year which was unusual and they ripened quickly and turned black as in Rosa spinosissima which further leads me (height of plant, density of growth, hip shape and color, resistance to blackspot) to believe that this rose has growth characteristics more closely related to R.spinosissima than to R. foetida. In my limited experience, I have not seen rose hips on any form of R. foetida that I have come across.

I am looking for the Williams Double Yellow Rose...This has alot of meaning to me since my grandmother used to have this..I would like to know where I can get one or a cutting....I live in the United States and would love to get one again..

Gardening Illustrated 6: 330 (Sept 13, 1884)
Williams’ double yellow Rose—I have sometimes seen this named Persian Yellow, but both in flower and habit of growth it greatly differs from that variety. The yellow Rose to which I refer was raised by Mr. Williams, of Pitmaston, about 1826, and was said to have been raised from the single Austrian Brier. This Rose is rarely to be found in Rose lists, and there must surely be some reason for the omission, as the tree is very distinct from the Persian or Harrison’s Yellow; the flowers are larger and it continues longer in flower. I would be glad to know the cause of this old-fashioned Rose falling out of the lists of Roses worth growing.— Charles McDonald, Stokesley.